The evidence of defendant's guilt of these crimes committed against five boys, aged eleven to fifteen, whom he persuaded to run away from home and join him in a makeshift shack in the woods near Pelham Bay, was strong and convincing and is not contested on appeal. Nevertheless, the trial prosecutor, in summation, found it necessary to misstate or mischaracterize the trial testimony; make himself an unsworn medical expert; improperly express his personal opinion regarding the victims' ability to recollect details of the crimes committed a year earlier; and, to ask, again improperly, the jury to express their opinion of defendant's conduct by their verdict.
While we deplore such excesses in the strongest possible terms and ask that prosecutors be trained and admonished to refrain from such unnecessary conduct, the misconduct here was not so persistent and egregious as to warrant reversal of the convictions in the interests of justice.
We have considered defendant's other points and find them without merit.
Concur — Rosenberger, J.P., Ellerin, Kupferman, Ross and Asch, JJ.